The modern communications era has brought about a tremendous expansion of wireline and wireless networks. Computer networks, television networks and telephony networks are experiencing an unprecedented technological expansion, fueled by consumer demand. Wireless and mobile networking technologies have addressed related consumer demands, while providing more flexibility and immediacy of information transfer.
Current and future networking technologies continue to facilitate ease of information transfer and convenience to users. In order to provide easier and/or faster information transfer and convenience, telecommunication industry service providers are developing improvements to existing networks. In this regard, wireless communication has become increasingly popular in recent years due, at least in part, to reductions in size and cost along with improvements in battery life and computing capacity of mobile electronic devices. As such, mobile electronic devices have become more capable, easier to use, and cheaper to obtain. Due to the now ubiquitous nature of mobile electronic devices, people of all ages and education levels are utilizing mobile terminals to communicate with other individuals or contacts, receive services and/or share information, media and other content.
Current and future networking technologies continue to facilitate ease of information transfer and convenience to users. In order to provide easier and/or faster information transfer and convenience, telecommunication industry service providers are developing improvements to existing networks. For example, the evolved universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) terrestrial radio access network (E-UTRAN) is currently being developed. The E-UTRAN, which is also known as Long Term Evolution (LTE) or 3.9G, is aimed at upgrading prior technologies by improving efficiency, lowering costs, improving services, making use of new spectrum opportunities, and providing better integration with other open standards.
One of the areas of development of E-UTRAN is broadcast and multicast communications, known as multimedia broadcast and multicast service (MBMS) in E-UTRAN parlance. Broadcast and multicast communications are generally a form of point-to-multipoint communications in which information is simultaneously transmitted from a single source to multiple destinations. Broadcast and multicast communications may be used to transmit a number of different types of content to a large number of people from emergency or general alert messages, e.g., weather alerts, to broadcast television, film, audio and other media content, e.g., newspapers.